I had thought too much had happened too quickly to make it possible for Palin to return to the radiance she projected in those brief days before she goofed in interviews with Couric and Gibson.

Yes, her supporters were willing to dismiss those embarrassing performances as the cynical work of the so-called liberal media’s attack machine. But for the more honest fans, Palin’s you-can-see-Russia-from-Alaska answers surely were a worry.

Then came all those stories about her lavish clothing binge in the run-up to the Republican National Convention. The details of that spending spree with other people’s money surely soured her reputation, at least a little, with the middle-America working families who saw themselves in her.

Post-election stories about Palin parading around in a towel in a hotel room while barking orders at male McCain staffers no doubt drove the stake deeper still.

It seemed that after bursting onto the scene as a fresh and promising “real woman” voice in conservative politics, with her touching decision to complete a pregnancy with a Down syndrome little boy, her realistic family complete with unwed pregnancies, love of outdoors, guns and machines, Palin had fallen into an Alaskan mud season from which there was no escape.

And though Palin herself was strong enough (or vain enough (we’re talking about a politician, we have to remember)) to go on Saturday Night Live and poke fun at herself, I couldn’t imagine that she would want to continue facing the constant ridicule and raw hatred from her legions of critics.

But with David Letterman forced to apologize for his jokes about her family this week, Palin, it seems to me, won a much greater prize than the comedian’s contrition.

Letterman’s jokes about Palin weren’t just focused on whether he meant 14-year-old Willow or 18-year-old Bristol. (And it IS creepy either way.) He also cracked wise that Sarah Palin looked like a “slutty flight attendant” and a range of slurs about her as a woman from the unsophisticated wilds of the hinterlands.

In doing so, the comedian crystallized all that is wrong with so much of the wrath exhibited against Palin.

Let’s face it. Plenty of politicians look dumb from time to time. Joe Biden has said ridiculous things, and he’s not loathed. George W. Bush – oh, well, let’s not even get started.

(And anyone who’s ever tried to go on camera knows it’s a lot easier to look dumb than otherwise; or maybe that’s just true with me.)

The point is, you don’t have to come across as slick as Tina Fey to make it in politics, and we all know that.

But with Palin, the attacks went far beyond attacking the person of Sarah Palin: They were attacks against millions of women – and men, too – all over this nation, but in the rising wave of opposition to the Bush administration, no one on the Left cared anymore.

They wanted blood. They got it.

Palin ran off to Alaska and except for the occasional tabloid intrigue over Bristol and Levi, and brief moments before nervous, should-we-invite-her GOP gatherings, she dropped off the public stage.

And she had seemed better off there.

But then Letterman made his jokes. And she demanded an apology, and he admitted he crossed the line.

And suddenly pundits are talking about Palin again and her 2012 prospects.

David Letterman’s jokes make it impossible for anyone to go after Sarah Palin again in those old ways.

From now on, the sting of his mistakes sets a new standard.

Break the Letterman Standard when mocking Palin now and you’ll risk looking like a pervert who finally got caught.

That’s not to say people won’t try. But it seems to me that the huge advantage the left had in attacking Palin finally became a grizzly bear she caught and skinned alive.

Joey Bunch has been a reporter for 28 years, including the last 12 at The Denver Post. For various newspapers he has covered the environment, water issues, politics, civil rights, sports and the casino industry.